Can I Smoke and Vape at the Same Time?

There is a common belief among people that vaping and smoking at the same time would lead to adverse effects on health. However, this is a misconception, as dual usage is considered a slower pathway to harm minimization with the same end result “fully switching to vaping”. Although the motivation to smokers is to make the switch to a 95% safer alternative than smoking, it actually depends on each person’s situation, mind state or willingness to kick the butts.

Same behavior can be seen for smokers who decide to quit using Nicotine replacement therapies, such as, patches, spray or gum. For people who has been smoking for more than 10 years, it can be hard to take control of the addiction, therefore struggle for the first few weeks to fully give up.

UK studies have done scientific test and researches proving positive results regarding E-cigarettes being more successful than other nicotine replacement therapies (sprays, lozenges and patches), as they miss on simulating the visual, hand to mouth action and social side of smoking. Either way, if a smoker try quitting with NRTs or taking a harm minimization approach, it’s normal to face a transition period where smoking still might take part of the process.

What does the community think about dual usage?

When e cigarettes were introduced, people perceptions about e-cigarette where divided, as some people viewed them as a safer alternative to smoking, while others though e-cigs would prolong the addiction to nicotine, especially for those whose transition period to vaping take more than just few days. Family, friends are coworkers who have never smoked, hardly understand how difficult is to control and give up addictions, and instead of offering help and support, they will be more judgmental if they find both smoking and vaping are happening at the same time.

They also speculate that vaping and smoking simultaneously leads to all health hazards that are typically caused by traditional cigarettes. This is incorrect as there are no proven evidences stating that dual usage will put one’s life at risk.

Is dual usage harmful?

While there are many debates as to whether e-cigarettes can help you quit smoking, there is no denying fact that the e-liquids are a safe alternative to tobacco cigarettes. According to a report from Public Health England, e-cigs are found to be 95% safer than traditional cigarettes. It really makes sense to believe that the dual usage can reduce the impacts of tobacco cigarettes on one’s health if smoking is reduced considerably, for example, from 40 to 2 cigarettes a days.

How dual usage works?

Let’s consider a common case: a 40 years dedicated smoker go through 40 smokes every day.

If this person was to turn into a dual user, for the first week of vaping e-cigs He will probably be going through 4 cigarettes a day instead of 40. By doing so, He will be reducing the health impacts caused by cigarette smoke by 90%. It gets a lot easier for vapers as the times pass, so by the second week, most likely the smoking rate will be reduce to less than 1%, which is the equivalent to “not finishing a full cigarette”. It’s very common to find vapers who try smoking after few weeks of vaping, and find cigarettes repulsing, not able to finish it. By then they have already started to feel the positive changes happening to their system.

Switching over from tobacco cigarettes to e-cigarette is not as easy as non-smokers can image. One must go through a tough transition period, but the dual usage can make a real difference. Vaping and smoking at the same time for as long as the transition period last, will help you recover faster from the smoking addiction, so dual usage is certainly a common step to go through until you achieve the final goal.